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DiManno: Rob Ford runs afoul of one dangerous little word: corruption

Or stank, back in 2006, and still, in 2010, amidst the mayoral election campaign, when the ordure really hit the fan.

Like dog poop stuck underfoot whilst walking in the Beaches parklands, the controversial, untendered 20-year contract awarded to the Boardwalk Café reeked of foul insider privilege. That lucrative deal — a re-up — gave George Foulidis exclusive rights for food and beverage concessions over a broad swath of territory, through his company, Tuggs Inc., which owned the restaurant.

Had he used just about any other term — shady, dubious, knavish — it’s unlikely the mayor would have found himself in court on Friday, retroactively arguing semantics.

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Corruption, however, is a red-flag designation, weighted with legal consequences. It implies criminality. Newspaper lawyers cannot abide it, unless there’s ample evidence to back up the allegation.

In the witness stand yesterday, Ford strained to avoid repeating it when, time and again, his words — captured on audiotape, quoted in the Toronto Sun — were flung back at him in cross-examination by Brian Shiller, Foulidis’ lawyer. “It’s not following the process,” he doggedly asserted. Expressed otherwise, from this horse’s mouth: “Horse-trading…”

Deals swung in private, is what Ford meant, the backroom maneuvering that is common in politics and which came under scrutiny in this specific incident, where the matter was discussed in camera by city council and then voted on in public — Ford present for the former, absent for the latter — and passed 15-12.

The language in dispute came originally from a meeting Ford had with the Sun’s editorial board. Out of that on-the-record session, the Sun published a story on Aug. 12, 2010, with a front page headline that blared: COUNCIL ‘CORRUPT’. The article that ran on Page 4 began with the writer reporting that the Tubbs contract smacked of civic corruption, according to Councillor Rob Ford says. It continued:

“I can’t accuse anyone or I can’t pinpoint it, but why do we have to go in-camera on the Tuggs deal?

“These in-camera meetings, there’s more corruption and skullduggery going on in there than I’ve ever seen in my life.”

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Shiller was insistent on parsing “corruption and skullduggery” and Ford just as insistent on evading the precise phrase. Technically, Ford could sing corruption-corruption-corruption all day long in the witness stand because courtroom testimony is privileged — can’t be sued for it. But that could make the case for the plaintiff a slam-dunk because it’s the crux of the thing.

Ford tried to explain the basis for which he made comments that the mayor now admits he can’t substantiate — pointing the finger of corruption at Foulidis and his council colleagues.

“That they don’t follow the process. So staff said, ‘You should go out on the Tuggs deal for competitive bids,’ they said no. I saw the local councillors work the room to try to get the votes to give the sole-source contract to Tuggs. It wasn’t just me. There was numerous councillors before, for the past, like I was saying, up to five years, before this was stamped. At council there was a lot of rumours going around that this deal does not smell right. Other councilors were saying it. The public was — I was getting called. I heard it over and over again, numerous times.’’

Shiller would not let him wiggle or extemporize.

“My question is … when you say, “and if Tuggs isn’t, I don’t know what is”, what (you’re) saying is, if Tuggs isn’t an example of corruption and skullduggery, I don’t know what is?”

There were objections from Ford’s lawyer but Superior Court Justice John Macdonald allowed the question.

Ford: “I’m going to repeat myself the best I can to explain and answer you. Here, I don’t agree with how the Tuggs deal was done and I used the word, when they don’t follow the process, and when staff recommends a (request for proposal) and you ignore it, I call that skullduggery and corruption, that’s the answer.”

And there it was, some two hours into a court appearance — not the mayor’s first — that had drawn a roomful of circling journalists.

The exchanges got testier as the day proceeded, Ford committing the unpardonable sin of an un-groomed witness — and surely he had been well-prepared by his legal team — of drifting away from safely terse responses, opening doors left and right for Shiller, suddenly expostulating about money exchanging hands, under the table, and “dirty deals,” talk of it from anonymous callers, all the while sinking deeper into the muck. “I can’t prove it, no.”

At one point, when agreeing he’d not requested a correction or clarification from the Sun, the mayor was halfway through a sentence suggesting he’s never asked for a retraction from the media on anything, then caught himself and acknowledged “one for sure.”

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